Thursday, April 28, 2016

My body was made to deliver babies. Carrying a baby for months is tough but labor I can do. As long as I have an epidural. We scheduled my induction date for April 1st. Our check in time was 7 am and my mom was awesome enough to come to my house at 6am to watch the girls. When we got to the hospital and checked in there was about 10 other couples in the waiting room and I jokingly told Doug "these are the ladies were racing today!" Who would have thought Cooper would have taken that so seriously.

My doctor came at 8:30 to break my water and shortly after she left my nurses started my first dose of pitocin. My nurse asked me shortly after I arrived if I wanted an epidural and I said yes! As soon as I could get it I wanted it. Doug again teased and said "if she could get a pre-epidural she would get it." But I kindly reminded her when they started my pitocin that I still wanted it as soon as possible. She told me they were waiting for me to have a good pattern with my contractions since I was having some but they didn't really hurt or I couldn't even feel them.

The next two hours went by pretty quick. I seriously mentioned my epidural at least 3 more times. I even reminded my nurse about the paper work I needed to sign to consent to have it. I just didn't want to feel any unnecessary pain because I'm a wimp and I was starting to feel contractions. Still not bad. Mostly felt like cramping. My nurse checked me again at 11:19 I was 100% effaced and at a 6. I came in at a 4 and 50% effaced so I was happy to progress. I thought "oh I'll probably start pushing in about an hour or two." But my contraction right after suddenly hurt. And the next one was worse and then the one after that REALLY hurt. I thought "man I'm a wimp! I barely start having contractions and I can't even handle them."

This is a good time to mention I had two nurses. One was new (Christy) so she was working with a more experienced nurse (Tami) just to make sure she was doing everything right but Christy was mostly with me and helping me. But at this time Tami came in and said "So she needs her epidural now." And I pointed to her and said "YES!" She had been watching my contractions and the baby on the monitor outside and could tell I was progressing quickly (I'm guessing that's what she did anyway.) they checked me again (it's 11:27) and I was at a 10. And then Brian the epidural guy came in, he's my favorite by the way because my contractions were crazy strong now. My epidural kicked in. I was so relieved. I told Brian I might name my son after him and he laughed. I was halfway serious at that time. Then they called my doctor and we were waiting on her and I told Doug "I'm suppose to be doing this all day! I didn't get to watch Netflix or have my epidural nap!" I panicked a little. There was too much excitement in just 30 min.

My doctor came in and they had me start pushing. The nurse said something about the baby "dipping" Before and said it was a little normal. But I suddenly remembered after my first set of pushes. The doctor asked the nurse to get the vacuum just in case. She reassured me that she wanted it "just in case I needed help." She was very calm and the nurses were pretty calm too but I could tell they were trying to keep me calm. I felt like there was something wrong and I NEEDED to get him out. So I pushed like I've never pushed before. And then my third correction I pushed super hard again and that's when my doctor said "okay he had the cord wrapped around his neck and I just unwrapped." I pushed again and she said "and i got the second loop." I was calm but I was freaking out on the inside. I pushed one more time and he was out!

They laid him on my chest and he was so purple and he wasn't moving at all. He was just limp. I panicked again and the nurse was wiping him trying to get him to move and I asked "is he okay!?!" I was rocking him with my hand trying to get him to cry or move or anything and then he finally did. So scary!

After everything was great with him. I really think I was in a little bit of shock for a while after. I couldn't even believe he was here and I was holding him. But I'm happy that our sweet boy was here and a nice 7lbs 15 ounces, 21.25 inches long on April 1, 2016 at 11:53am!